Statute Law Revision Bill 2013

WARNING: This Digest was prepared for debate. It reflects the legislation as introduced and does not canvass subsequent amendments. This Digest does not have any official legal status. Other sources should be consulted to determine the subsequent official status of the Bill.

The main purpose of the Statute Law Revision Bill 2013 (the Bill) is to correct minor and technical errors in Acts, fix references to amending Acts, modernise language, and repeal redundant provisions and Acts.[2] The Bill also repeals the Air Passenger Ticket Levy (Collection) Act 2001 and the Air Passenger Ticket Levy (Imposition) Act 2001, and provides for necessary amendments due to recent changes to the Acts Interpretation Act 1901 and the Legislative Instruments Act 2003.[3]

For the last 30 years, Statute Law Revision Bills have been used to address technical errors that have occurred as a result of drafting and clerical mistakes, and to ensure that obsolete legislation is removed from the statute books.

As stated by the Attorney-General, Mark Dreyfus:

The bills do not make substantive changes to law but still perform the important function of repairing minor errors in the Commonwealth statute books and improving the accuracy and useability of consolidated versions of Commonwealth acts.[4]

It would appear that the Office of Parliamentary Counsel encourages the drafting of such Bills and has commented that ‘it is likely there will be a Statute Law Revision Bill in each Spring Sittings’.[5] Statute Law Revision Bills play an important role in correcting minor drafting errors and removing references to legislation that has since been repealed. They are often referred to as a way of ‘cleaning up the statute book’.[6] There is no actual physical statute book in existence; instead the use of the term ‘statute book’ is a conceptual way to encompass the body of enacted Commonwealth statutes.

The Attorney General has also commented that this Bill ‘helps make the law clearer, more consistent and easier to access’[7] and ‘helps to facilitate the publication of consolidated versions of acts by the Attorney-General’s Department and private publishers of legislation’.[8]

As required under Part 3 of the Human Rights (ParliamentaryScrutiny) Act 2011 (Cth), the Government has assessed the Bill’s compatibility with the human rights and freedoms recognised or declared in the international instruments listed in section 3 of that Act. The Government considers that the Bill is compatible.[13]

Upon considering the Bill, the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights stated that ‘the bill does not appear to give rise to human rights concerns’.[14]

Schedule 1 makes minor corrections to a number of principal Acts, including correcting grammatical and numbering errors, as well as removing references to provisions that have since been repealed. Schedule 1 contains seventy six amendments to principal Acts.

Schedule 2 makes similar amendments to a number of amending Acts, as well as correcting various misdescribed amendments and repealing some redundant provisions. Schedule 2 contains sixteen amendments to amending Acts.

Schedule 3 amends a number of Acts to reflect recent amendments to the Acts Interpretation Act 1901 and the enactment of the Legislative Instruments Act 2003. Part 1 amends the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Act 1983, the Child Support (Registration and Collection) Act 1988 and the Inspector-General of Taxation Act 2003 to repeal redundant provisions relating to acting appointments, which are now covered by sections 33A and 33AB of the Acts Interpretation Act. Part 2 amends the Fisheries Levy Act 1984 and the Fisheries Management Act 1991 to remove a legislative reference to section 49A of the Acts Interpretation Act, which has since been repealed, and replaces it with a reference to section 14 of the Legislative Instruments Act, which replicates the content of former section 49A of the Acts Interpretation Act. Part 3 amends a number of Acts to repeal and replace references to ‘disallowable instruments’ with ‘legislative instruments’. Schedule 3 contains 342 amendments to Acts of general application.

Schedule 5 repeals the Air Passenger Ticket Levy (Collection) Act 2001 (the Collection Act) and the Air Passenger Ticket Levy (Imposition) Act 2001 (the Imposition Act), which were introduced on 1 October 2001 in response to the collapse of the Ansett group.

The history behind the introduction of these Bills is set out in the Explanatory Memorandum:

The legislation provided for a $10 levy to be placed on air tickets sold within Australia to fund (under the Special Employee Entitlements Scheme for Ansett group employees, or SEESA) the paying of: all unpaid wages, annual leave, long service leave, pay in lieu of notice and up to eight weeks of redundancy payments for former employees of the Ansett Group.

The levy remained in effect until 1 July 2003, as the then Minister for Transport and Regional Services notified in the Gazette (as per section 12 of the Collection Act) dated 18 June 2003 that the levy would conclude after June 2003.

The final SEESA report (as required under section 24 of the Collection Act), covering the year to March 2012, noted that all eligible former Ansett group employees have now received 100% of the SEESA payments they are entitled to and any further payments were the responsibility of the Ansett administrators, KordaMentha. KordaMentha advised the final distribution of funds occurred in September 2011.[15]

As the levy is no longer in place and all the funds that were collected had now been distributed by KordaMentha, the Collection Act and the Imposition Act are now considered to be obsolete and can therefore be repealed.

There is no doubt that the review process undertaken in the preparation of this Bill serves to ensure the statute book contains less clutter, in the form of out-dated cross-references, and by repealing obsolete Acts.[16]

Members, Senators and Parliamentary staff can obtain further information from the Parliamentary Library on (02) 6277 2430.

[6]. M Dreyfus, ‘Second reading speech: Statute Law Revision Bill 2013’, op. cit., p. 2714. In his second reading speech, the Attorney-General stated that the Bill will ‘ensure the statute book contains less clutter’.

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